My History With This
Movie
I was 9
years old when this movie came out, and although it was one of many
ultraviolent movies in the 1980s I was forbidden to see, the Robocop franchise (W) became a
cultural phenomenon that was impossible to be unaware of: the 2 sequels (W , W), and the usual publicity campaigns which accompanied their release,
the toys and the merchandizing, the various cartoon spin offs (W, W), and the TV shows (W, W)…and of course all the schoolyard
talk from my classmates who had seen it.
Why I Saw This Movie
Once the hype from the franchise
had died away, the adult me used to just dismiss this movie as another dumb
1980s action flick, and one not particularly worth seeing, but a couple of things
recently put this movie back on my radar:
* I gained respect for the director Paul Verhoeven
after listening to his director’s commentary on Starship Troopers, and listening to him talk about the nature of fascism in society, and Chomsky’s theories of media control, which
made me think it was not so easy to dismiss him as just another dumb action
movie director.
* My respect for Paul Verhoeven increased
more after seeing Black Book.
* A Scottish friend of mine is a huge fan of this movie,
and, while he was ranting about how it was sacrilege to remake Robocop (W) he was telling me
about all the themes and political satire in the original Robocop, and he increased my interest.
* That same friend, when I confessed that I had never seen
the original, was appalled, and insisted that I come over and watch it with
him.
And so,
here I am reviewing it…
Positives
* Not your standard predictable action movie—there are a lot
of unpredictable elements in the screenplay that keep you guessing as to where
the writers are going with this story.
* Lots of political satire—much of which is arguably just as
relevant now as it was in the 1980s: urban decay, crime, the desire for
law-and-order leading to fascism, the corporatization of the military and
police, the military industrial complex, the role of the media in creating a
militaristic society, the parallels between crime syndicates and corporations,
and the thin line between capitalists operating in legal markets and
capitalists operating in illegal markets, and more.
* Lots of black humor.
* Great acting by a talented cast (Kurtwood Smith (W) is particularly brilliant.)
Negatives
* A bit dated—special effects and action sequences which
must have seemed incredible in the 1980s are now unimpressive.
* The first two acts of this film are brilliant, but the 3rd
act throws away all of this potential and just degenerates into a typical,
boring, action film.
The Review
Not at all what I thought this
film would be—I had thought Robocop (based on my knowledge from the cartoon
series) would be a generic action hero.
Instead, he’s
merely a pawn in the schemes of others.
And when he starts following his own agendas instead of his
pre-programmed commands, there are hints of Frankenstein’s monster.
It’s a very
interesting idea which, combined with the political satire, black humor, and
corporate intrigue of this film, make for an interesting premise.
Unfortunately,
the 3rd act abandons all of this potential and degenerates into a typical
action film.
Rating :
7 out of 10 Stars (If the last third of the film had
maintained the promise of the first two acts, I would have been tempted to give
this film 8 or 9 stars, but alas….)
Links
One of the things hinted at in Roger Ebert’s review, and
confirmed by Wikipedia (W) is that this film had to go through
multiple edits to tone down its violence until the MPAA would give
it an R rating. Even as it is though, it’s
still a very violent film. (….Or at
least it was for its time. After Sin City, Tarantino, and
other films, I think it’s safe to say standards have changed. But leaving that aside…)
In
retrospect, it is therefore strange to remember how much this franchise was
marketed to children back in the day with tie-in cartoon shows and Robocop
toys. (As mentioned above, the cartoon
show and the toys were my only point of contact with this franchise back in the
1980s.) This youtube video here does a good job of pointing out that absurdity.
(The video
hints, somewhat tongue in cheek, that the marketing of adult films to children
was a cultural phenomenon unique to the time period. What do you guys think? True?
Or is this not unique to the 80s?)
And one
last link:
I think its
a common experience for people my age to have grown up in the 1980s being aware
of these ultra-violent action franchises, but not being able to see them, and
then only much later to track down these films as adults, and find out they’re
not what we expected at all, and that the original was actually more
intelligent and deep than we gave it credit for, and that it was only the
sequels and resulting franchise that degenerated into the mindless action we
associated with the film. This has been
my experience with Robocop, and it
also parallels my experience (and I think the experience of many other people
my age) with the original Rambo—another
film which I was surprised to find was so completely tonally different from the
mindless action franchise it spawned. An
excellent breakdowns of the elements and themes from the first Rambo comes from Whisky - Prajer.
Link of the Day
The Myth of the Liberal Media: The Propaganda Model of News
And from Tom Tomorrow: The Thin Veil of Rationality
And on a different note: 10 Reasons to Fall in Love with Cambodia
And from Tom Tomorrow: The Thin Veil of Rationality
And on a different note: 10 Reasons to Fall in Love with Cambodia
No comments:
Post a Comment